like to call to order the Monroe County Public Library Board of Trustees meeting for January 21st, 2026.
So happy new year, everybody. Do I have a motion to approve the consent agenda from last meeting? It
includes the minutes from December 10th, monthly financial report, monthly bills payment, personnel
report, and board meeting calendar. Second.
comment on the minutes from December we have an error in there under attendance I think Kathy it says
you are in attendance I believe you weren't in December so we just made an edit to that in the minutes
that we're gonna share on with the State Board of Accounts so as long as you all are good with that
we'll proceed with those edits all in favor say aye aye those opposed say nay ayes have it
And next, we're going to hear from Greer in the director's monthly report. OK. So you'll notice at the
top of the report, it says average estimated door count for the month. We don't typically do that. The
reason is our door count software was offline for much of December. So the daily visit count is an average
based on a number of previous year's December door counts rather than an actual door count from our software.
Total library card holders increased in 2025 from month to month every consecutive month. That's really
exciting to see. Usually by increments of 100 to 200 patrons a month. Our total number of library card
holders at the start of 26 is 58,931. That's about 42% of our county's total population. That's fantastic
statistics for us. So we'll keep working on that and keep pushing for 50% of the county.
As expected, we ended the year with the best overall circulation we've seen since before the pandemic.
Most of this is due to incredibly strong and increasing digital circulation. Thanks once again to our
outstanding collection development department for the selection, cataloging, and discovery solutions
they oversee and enhance on a regular basis, and of course to all of our staff for consistently promoting
and supporting the use of our collections at all service points.
We recently added a new and somewhat unique digital circulation item, our Adobe Creative Cloud Suite.
Patrons can now reserve a temporary license for Adobe Creative Cloud Suite using our room reservation
platform. We're going to track these reservations started in 2026 alongside our digital collection
statistics. And we look forward to sharing some new statistics and trends in terms of the use of Adobe
Creative Cloud Suite as we see them taking shape.
Our main downtown public elevators were offline for some extended periods of time in December. This
isn't the first time this has happened, but there was quite a bit of that in December. We plan to replace
the elevator soon, and our finance meeting report references how we're going to do this relative to
the renewal of our bonds. In the meantime, a big thank you to Brian Leibacher and our entire building
services team for managing these outages and for working closely with our elevator maintenance contractor
to get these up and running as quickly as possible. And above all,
Apologies to our patrons and thank you for your patience whenever these elevators go down. There were
a ton of cool program updates and anecdotes from our December program offerings and rather than highlight
a few, I just want to thank our public services staff for planning and delivering such outstanding programs
and for engaging our patrons the way they do during these programs.
We also had a hugely successful annual open enrollment process for staff benefits, both in terms of
the ease of use of Paylocity's benefits portal and in terms of total number of staff who completed the
open enrollment process in advance of the deadline. Most people don't know this, but open enrollment
can be quite a headache when you've got over 160 employees and you need to get everybody to fill it
out even if all they're going to say is, I decline benefits. But staff did great and Paylocity made
it really, really easy for us.
And 2026 is our last year under the current strategic plan. We'll share a final update on progress made
on this plan and specific department action items completed.
on or before the July board meeting, and at the start of quarter two, give or take, we're gonna form
our new strategic planning committee, which traditionally involves one MCPL trustee, and we'll reach
out with that information and invitation at that time. The next strategic plan will be shared in draft
form at the November meeting and then formally adopted at the December meeting. Happy to answer any
questions about the director's report.
Quick question about the Adobe Creative Suite. Did we purchase more than one license, and what is the
circulation time for that for people who choose to reserve it? So I don't know, Josh, if you or Lorraine
want to speak to that with some specifics. I know you've both been involved in setting that up. Yeah,
we went round and round about that.
I wanna say two, we started with two, but I could be a little bit off and I'll circle back. We looked
at the different models for also circulation and the institutions we looked at before were doing it
for 24 hour periods, basically starting when you made your reservation, but they were academic environments
and they keep different hours. So I think we landed on six hours,
and maybe a max of 12 a week. But again, I'm not 100% sure. I will find that out and send it to you,
Greer, and then get it back to you folks. It does say on Communico. Any corrections, Lorraine? Okay.
I'm so sorry. Yeah, it's right on Communico, the same way you would do reserving a room or our Zoom.
So it works very similar to that. So I may even be able to find that before this meeting is over and
raise my hand and wave it back at you. And as a wave of apology, we were kind of doing a soft start
with that, too. We're planning a good promotion for it to get it out. Yeah, that'll be great.
Thank you. Thanks. And this wasn't in the report, but just, Greer, if you could give a reminder, I know
we are looking at severe weather coming up.
And just to remind people where they could look to see if that would impact the library. Definitely.
So for the public, always check our website. As soon as we make a decision on opening late or closing
altogether, we'll post it to the top banner of our website. But we also update our social media accounts,
and we update our voicemails. So if patrons call the library and we're not open, they're going to be
met with, hey, we're closed today, and here's why.
Yes, we do. That's probably where most people get that information when it happens. Any other questions
or comments before we move on? May I have a motion to hear and vote tonight to approve the Hoosier start
proposal? Becky, would you come on up and tell us what you know?
So as a reminder, the Hoosier start, and I apologize if I wasn't clear last month when we talked about
this, I think it got confused with our perf plan. So just to kind of start out a little bit, this is
a voluntary retirement plan for staff. It sits nicely next to perf, so it doesn't replace perf or compete
with it in any way. It is a voluntary plan that staff would contribute to on their own.
if they want to participate in it. And so it would basically be replacing our old our current 403 B
plan that we have, which is a voluntary plan and Hoosier start is a state funded plan. So the state
comptroller is the fiduciary on the plan. It gives us the ability to be part of a
457 plan that has more than 70,000 participants. There's more than $2 billion in assets in the plan.
There are more than 60 counties who participate, fire departments, libraries, et cetera, across the
state that participate in this plan. So it gives us some of that larger benefit for staff. One of the
questions that we asked last time that I didn't have the answer to was how many libraries participate
in the plan. And there are 93 participating libraries in the state of Indiana.
And then as a reminder, this does offer folks the ability to do pre-tax or Roth contributions as a way
to save for retirement. And then we're able to offer it for all staff. So part-time staff and full-time
staff would be eligible to participate if they did want to contribute to their own retirement. And then
there's a $15 minimum contribution per paycheck. So it makes it very affordable for staff and attainable
for people to participate wherever they're at.
in life and be able to save for retirement. And then there is a $54 annual fee that staff pay. If they
want to participate, that's just the fee to manage the accounts. Most other plans have percentages.
That's how they set up their fees. And so this is just a flat $54 admin fee that's part of
staff participating in this. So there's no cost to the library. It's not replacing our current perf
plan. It just kind of sets us next to that.
Sorry, I know that was a lot of information, but just kind of as a refresher. Yeah. You may have answered
it and I forget, so I apologize. Is this something that they can enroll and unenroll in at any time
during employment? Yes.
also change contributions to it at any point in time as well. So I did speak with three referrals as
part of my work since our last meeting where I asked libraries and county governments who are participating
in the plan how it's worked for their staff. And they've said that it is overwhelmingly positive benefit
for staff. It's very easy to administer the education piece from nationwide is very I guess above and
beyond what they had expected.
Nationwide does come in to meet with folks to educate them and help them Look at their perf plan as
well as their retirement plan and make decisions that are appropriate for them Any other questions before
we vote All in favor of the Hoosier start proposal say aye aye Those opposed say nay I have it
with an update on the question Jamie that you asked about the creative suite two licenses up to six
hours per day and 18 hours per week reserved through level up location in Communico and up to seven
days in advance for reservation thank you Josh okay next we're gonna hear about the remote work policy
update and our next steps for that
So just to be clear, we're not bringing the policy forward at this meeting. We just wanted to have more
of a conversation and share some information and then plan to bring the new policy to you all next month
to approve. So I think you can see the current policy. It's just a temporary policy that was approved
last year. It's in the packet on page 52 and 53.
Some reminders because I know not everyone has looked at that recently. This is a benefit that's new
to MCPL as of 2025. It was requested from our staff during our compensation study with NFP. So NFP was
the provider that came in for our compensation study.
They did like staff feedback where everyone got the opportunity to answer surveys and provide some feedback.
And then they also did focus groups with staff with managers and with some different cross sections
of our folks. And one of the things that we heard from staff specifically was the request for remote work.
And so we have worked very diligently to come up with a policy that we felt kept our culture because
it is unique to be in a library. We don't want patrons showing up in our living rooms and we want folks
to feel connected here at work. So we did want to protect the culture and still offer meaningful benefits
for folks aligning with strategic goal number five.
And then also staying equitable. Not every staff member is going to be eligible for remote work. Just
given the nature of different positions that we have here. But we did come up with a policy that says
you can do 90 percent or 20 percent of your non public facing work can be remote. So that gives our
folks who are public facing some opportunities to do planning or
You know training there are some different opportunities for those folks to do remote work that wouldn't
be patron facing and then our folks who are not public facing have the ability to do up to one day a
week remote. So it does give some meaningful benefit there for folks without going too far one direction
or the other.
And we do offer two different types of remote work. So there is an ongoing or like a standing remote
arrangement. So folks can ask for like a specific day of the week to work remote or a couple of days
a month where they're wanting to work remote from another location. And our policies has some requirements
for the setup and the space and scheduling, communicating with their department and their manager. And
then our one-off requests are a little bit more
for like specific tasks or projects like one-off trainings that folks are attending. It works really
nicely for folks who have like a home repair that's scheduled and they need to be home to let a technician
in or some sort of a pre-arranged situation that they have where they just need to be in another location
for the day. So we tried to give a whole array of folks the opportunity to work remote and the opportunity
to have things that fit where folks were needing based on the feedback that they had given us.
We are just over a year into the pilot program. We've seen success with it I have some stats for the
number of folks who have made requests and have used the policy So we had 39 requests over the last
year 15 of those were for ongoing Requests so those are standing maybe one day a week where folks are
wanting to work remote on a specific day and Then we had 24 one-off requests. So those are
for a particular training that someone was attending or a project or like I mentioned some of those,
like I have a technician coming and I need to let them in. And so we've seen both sides of the policy
used. I think probably the biggest thing that we've had staff question wise has been if we're going
to open it up and make it more
days remote and I don't think that we intend to do that because I feel like that 20% has been a really
good balance and has given a meaningful opportunity for folks while also keeping the equity in mind.
So I think that's been the only piece of feedback that I've heard from staff where a potential change
would be looked at. But do you all have any questions or is there any other information that I can share?
Anything that I've missed, Greer? No, just I would say,
This all ties back to the compensation study and changes that we made in 22 and 23. This was one of
the big things that came back from the staff focus groups, the desire to have something like remote
or hybrid work options to some extent, with the understanding that because we're a public-facing institution,
we couldn't have a blanket remote work policy of any kind, hence what Becky's been saying about a 20%
limit. So we took a pretty conservative approach to drafting the policy.
And a pretty conservative approach to reviewing the request. But like Becky said, so far it's worked
really, really well. Our staff have used it very responsibly. So we'll probably come back next month
and say we think we ought to formally adopt it and move it out of the pilot stage and into a formal
benefit for staff. And one of the reasons we took it so seriously, apart from the fact that it came
from so many staff members, is that we recognize it keeps us more competitive in terms of the job market.
So yeah, we're pleased with how it's been working.
Do we have any additional questions? Okay. Thank you. Motion to hear from Greer about the board bylaws
update. Second. Okay. So last month we talked briefly about our bylaws.
And I shared that the state library requires that we review and approve these whether we update them
or not every three years. The last time we did that I think was 2019 at least formally. So we're a little
behind and that's OK. One of the things that we want to ask.
is something, Amy, I think that you had brought up in a meeting, which is would it make more sense to
put public comment at the top of our agenda rather than leave it for the very end, maybe for the obvious
reason that a lot of folks may come to our meetings expecting to say something about an agenda item
that they've seen advertised when we post the agenda only to learn that we go through the vote before
they have a chance. I believe the school board does this now. There are other public boards that put
public comment at the very top.
So that's something we might want to consider changing. Most of our bylaws are tied to Indiana law,
specifically what's called the library law. So there's not a lot we do in changing that. But this is
our opportunity to talk about that idea about public comment in our meeting agendas or anything else
in the bylaws you all have questions about or want to make changes to. And then we would update these
and I would inform the state library.
Do you want to lead the public comment idea? Sure. I mean, just thinking through making good use of
the public's time if they were to engage with the board and being able to provide comments so that if
someone raised a concern that led us to act differently or ask different questions, I would like to
hear that before I have the opportunity to hear that before we vote.
Also, someone wants to make a simple comment. This is a lot of board meeting for them. It's an hour
of someone's time to need to make a comment to make sure that they'll be here, able to sign in, do the
things that they need to do. So being able to leave a comment in 15 or 20 minutes time seems more reasonable.
So can we vote then to move that to the top? Yes.
We can change that under, what is this, article four, meetings, section five, order of business shall
be, and we'll just move public comment to the top. And if you're okay, we can leave board comment at
the bottom just before adjournment. And are there any other thoughts on changes to the bylaws at this
time? What we'll do is build into our calendar for
2028, heads up, we need to review the bylaws at the start of the next year, just so we don't miss it.
It's an easy thing to overlook. And we'll kind of do a version of this every three years. But we can
make this change immediately and we can start our February meeting with public comment at the top of
the meeting. So it'll be after the call to order before the consent agenda? Correct. Sounds good. Great.
OK. All in favor of moving that to the top of the meeting, say aye.
Hi. Those opposed say nay. Okay, board bylaws, we will update that part. Thank you. Okay, now we have
some new business. Motion to hear the resolution to transfer program funds between restricted categories
from our director of finance, Gary. So this resolution is to transfer
$26,390.06 from the program fund to the restricted gift fund. And what's happening here is that in our
restricted gift fund, we have these program lines that are funded by endowed accounts. And so when the
Friends of the Library
Determine their annual gift to support programs and and for 2026 that amount is a hundred and forty
three thousand dollars at this point and So we will take out of that hundred and forty three thousand
dollars twenty six thousand three ninety and Move it to the restricted gift fund for these loans
So are there any questions on that? No questions? Okay. All in favor of moving $26,390.06 from the program
fund to restricted gift fund? Say aye. Aye. Those opposed say nay. Ayes have it.
a motion to hear the resolution to transfer operating funds between major categories. So this resolution
is mainly for auditors. They insist that we do this. If we have a situation where our actual cost in
a major category, which is wages and benefits, supplies, services,
and capital spending. So if we go over in one of those categories and we're under in another category,
we can transfer budget funds with a resolution like this. And so we were over on the wages and benefits,
wages and benefits category. And so that's why we are transferring out of the other services and charges
category $200,000.
Questions To transfer operating funds between major categories say aye aye those opposed say nay I have
it Thanks for hanging out Gary Motion to hear about the resolution to transfer funds to the rainy day fund
And we'll talk a little bit more about the results, the operating results for the library in the Board
of Finance meeting. But just for this resolution, we ended up with an operating surplus of $321,066.
And so this resolution allows us to move those surplus funds
from the operating fund to the rainy day fund. And yeah, that's what this is. Any questions? Will you
remind us please what the purpose of the operating fund versus the rainy day fund can be used for or
what the, can you explain a little bit more why this transfer is needed? Yeah.
Operating fund is basically where all of the revenue from taxes to cover operations comes in. And then
that's where we pay out all the wages and purchase books and everything. And so the operating fund starts
out the year with a million dollar balance. That's the reserve balance in the operating fund.
And so throughout the year, we have our revenue, we have our expenses. So now we're at the end of the
year and we have 1,321,066 in the operating account. So this is like a reset. We're gonna reset it to
a million dollars and we're gonna take the 321,000 and put it in the rainy day fund where we accumulate
funds for future expansion
That's generally what it's for, future expansion. By state law, we can use rainy day funds for a number
of different things if we need to, which is why they call it rainy day. It's very different from library
improvement and reserve fund, for example, which can only be used for specific types of projects. So
that's one reason why we keep a healthy balance in the rainy day account and transfer funds to it whenever
we can, because it's basically a savings account for the library.
For what? I'm sorry. Could the money be used for the bookmobile that they're trying to? I don't know
if we could use it for something like a bookmobile. We have our funds for the bookmobile. They're paid
for by the bond funds. But for rainy day, I don't know if that would qualify. I would have to check.
If we had not planned for funding the bookmobile with the bond fund, which we did, then we could. We
could use rainy day funds.
keep a healthy balance and all the time just in case. Yeah. Emergency situations as well. Yes. All in
favor of transferring the funds to the rainy day funds, say aye. Aye. Those opposed say nay. Ayes have
it. Thank you, Gary.
Next up, we have nominations for our board of trustee officers for the next year. I'm going to start
off by nominating Chris as secretary again. Anyone want to second? How about Amy Shaughnessy as treasurer?
I nominate.
I'm going to nominate you to be vice president. Thank you. And then Jamie for president. OK. All right.
OK. And the reason then Whitney is taking over for vice president for Kathy is because Kathy is leaving
us, resigning her tenure. She's given many, many years to the library. So thank you, Kathy. It's been
my pleasure.
I'm humbled by your service, Kathy. I know you've been a part of the library for a very, very long time
in different capacities. The 1970s, in fact. In fact, I met my husband here. Oh, wow. I did not know
that. Well, on behalf of everyone at MCPL, thank you so much for your service. We will miss you.
It's time. It's time. You're welcome. OK. Do we have any public comments?
Last time, I ask at the end. We do. Hi. I'm Paula Gray over to you. I work here at the library. I've
worked here at the library for like 30 years. I'm the web administrator, but I recently just became
the union president. I just wanted to introduce myself to the board, let you know that.
Tomorrow at the library, 1130 to 130, staff there in the union are using their lunch time to have a
little treat and greet. So if any of you are available, want to come by and meet some other union members
or get some coffee and cookies, chat about the union in any regard, you're welcome to do so. That's
all I have. Thank you very much.
not to embarrass or anything, but Paula, as our web administrator, is the one who has single-handedly
been modifying all of our PDFs on our website, including our board content, and making them HTML and
more accessible. So thank you for that work, Paula. Yeah. OK. At this time, we are adjourned. I'd like
to call to order the Monroe County Public Library Board of Finance Committee meeting for January 21.
I would like to nominate myself as president for the board of finance and Chris Hall as secretary. Anyone
want a second? Do we take a vote? Okay, all in favor say aye. Those opposed say nay. Okay, ayes have
it. Okay, now we're gonna hear from Gary for the review of investment report and policy.
So Indiana code requires each local board of finance to have an annual meeting in January. This meeting
provides an opportunity to review the library's investment policy and the investment report and go over
finance plans for the upcoming year. 2025 has been a year heavily influenced by Senate Bill 1, which
will decrease the expected annual revenue growth in 2026.
by about $358,000. The library has implemented operational changes to prepare for the revenue reduction,
including a reduction of five full-time employees over the 2025-26 time frame. The 2025 staff reductions
and reducing the evening hours for the downtown location have had an impact
in the library's efforts to keep 2025 operating costs lower than the 2025 operating revenue. The 2025
operating surplus of about 321,000 was less than last year's surplus of about 803,000. For the next
few years, it'll be a challenge to have any operating surplus.
The third page in the Board of Finance report is the balance sheet, and it shows the cash balance by
bank and by fund. The total cash balance for all MCPL funds at the end of 2025 is about $8,012,000 compared
to about $8,064,000 at the start of 2025.
The rainy day fund will have a balance of about $3,365,000 after the 2025 surplus transfer. And a million
of that balance is kept in reserve. So $2,365,000 is the balance carried forward for future planning
in the rainy day fund. Most of the library's cash is at First Financial Bank,
where we have a checking account and a money market account that is currently earning 3.1% a year. The
balance in the money market account at the end of the year was about $7.8 million. Interest earnings
for 2025 on the money market account funds was about $215,000.
On the second page of the Board of Finance report, I have presented an option for a long-term plan to
finance future projects with funds from issuing future bonds. Looking ahead to 2027 and beyond, we've
started planning for the next general obligation bond. The current general obligation bond
was for $2 million and it was issued in 2021. So it's a six-year bond and it'll be paid off at the end
of 2027. So our current plan is to renew the bond, which is a process involving bond attorneys and the
process will start in early 2027. So next year at this time, that's gonna be on the agenda.
And we expect it to be a seven-year bond for $3 million. The current six-year bond is being used to
purchase the new bookmobile. And then facility needs like elevator repairs and that type of thing. And
it's also being used for technology needs.
We have a replacement cycle that keeps our tech equipment from becoming obsolete. And so bond funds
are the source of funds for buying computers and tech equipment software. How often do we like the cycle?
I think it's five years. So
Looking ahead to the new bond that would cover the 2028 to 2034 timeframe, we would still use the bond
to pay for facility needs and technology needs. One major additional project that we're considering
for the next bond is the replacement of the tall shelving at the main branch.
so that it has shelving similar to what is at the southwest branch, which provides a big improvement
in visibility. Another big project being discussed is the need to replace the aging elevators at the
main branch. Maintenance is extremely costly for the old elevators, and reliability is deteriorating rapidly.
So next year at the annual Board of Finance meeting, we will discuss the bond renewal in more detail.
And then the operating fund surplus report is on page four of this report. And this report shows the
actual revenue and operating cost trends from 2021 to the present.
and an estimate for revenue and operating costs for 2026. We won't go into the detail unless someone
has a question. It's more of an informational report to put 2025 operating numbers in context with past
years and the upcoming year. So the final report in the packet is the investment policy.
We haven't made any changes to that this year. And if there's any questions on that, I'd be happy to
talk about them. That's all I have. Any questions?
Assuming things may change funding-wise for libraries in the future, will it make a difference? I mean,
will we just update it on a? Yeah, I expect we'll sort of see this long-term plan get adjusted every
year. And so, yeah, just depending on what happens, we may just be struggling to keep our
head above water for several years. But on the other hand, something may change. We could be in a position
where revenue does go up as fast as it did in the years leading up to when we built the Southwest Branch.
You'll notice on page two, there's a reference to the subsequent bond and the idea of something like
an East Branch
construction project. So this is something we've kind of kicked around very quietly among ourselves
for a few years. It's not a commitment necessarily to building another southwest, but on the east side.
But a number of us, Gary and myself in particular, have been talking about how we need to continue to
look for opportunities to expand MCPL's presence, physical presence throughout the county. And the east
side is conspicuously without any MCPL presence apart from our
outreach services department. So we want to keep that in our minds as we're planning financially for
the long term that there should be an opportunity somewhere down the road to continue to expand our
footprint. Don't really know exactly when it's going to be, so we're keeping that in our reports as well.
That's it. Okay, thanks Gary. Okay, we don't have any more questions comments. Motion to adjourn. Second,
we are adjourned.